The Evolution of Counseling Psychology docx

The
Evolution
of
Counseling
Psychology
Donalo
H.
Blocher
~~~
Springer Publishing
Company
The Evolution
of
Counseling
Psychology
Donald H. Blocher, Ph.D.,
is
a profes-
sor emertitus
of
counseling psychology
at the State University of New York
at
Albany. Dr. Blocher received his Ph.D.
in
counseling psychology
at
the University
of Minnesota.
He
is

a Fellow of the Ameri-
can Psychological Association and a
past
president of the Division of Counseling
Psychology.
Dr.
Blocher has served
on
the faculties of
the
University of Minne-
sota and the University of Western
On-
tario as well as
at
the University at Albany.
He
was also a Fulbright Professor at the University of Keele in
the
United Kingdom.
He
has been a visiting lecturer
at
a number of
universities
in the United States and abroad. Dr. Blocher
is
the
author
of a number of books including

Developmental Counseling now in
its
4th
edition, and has contributed numerous
book
chapters
and
journal articles
to
the counseling literature.
Dr.
Blocher has taught
history in the public schools, served as a school counselor and school
psychologist, and was an Intelligence
Officer in the United States Air
Force.
He
is
currently engaged
in
writing and consulting.
The Evolution
of
Counseling
Psychology
Donald
H.
Blocher, PhD
[~j
Springer Publishing Company

Copyright©
2000
by Springer Publishing Company,
Inc.
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Acquisitions Editor: Bill Tucker
Production Editor:
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Cover design by Susan Hauley
oo
o 1
02 03

04
I s 4 3 2 1
Ubrary
of
Congress Cataloging-in-Publication
Data
Blocher, Donald H.
The
evolution
of
counseling psychology I Donald
H.
Blocher.
p. em.
h1cludes
bibliographical references and index.
ISBN
0-8261-1348-6
1. Counseling-United
States-History.
I.
Title
BF637.C6.B473
2000
158'3 dc21
Printed in the United States of America
Photo Credits
00-020289
CIP
John

Dewey, James McKeen Cattell,
G.
Stanley Hall, Leona Tyler,
Lewis
M.
Terman,
Jean
Piaget, courtesy of the Archive of the History
of American Psychology, University of Akron, Akron,
Ohio. Donald
Super, courtesy of Donald Blocher. Henry Borow, courtesy of Marian
Borow. Alfred Binet, Sigmund Freud, Carl Jung, Alfred Adler, Carl
Rogers, Ivan
Pavlov, B. F. Skinner, courtesy of
the
University of
Sonoma Web Site.
To Henry Borow,
a student of and
maker of
the
history of counseling psychology
Fhispage intentionally left hlank
List
of
Figures
Preface
Introduction
Chapter 1
Chapter 2

Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Contents
Part I
In
the
Beginning
Guidance: A
Product of the American
Conscience
ix
xi
xiii
1
3
The Rise of Applied Psychology
33
The Professionalization of Counseling 7 5
Psychology
The Search for a Professional Identity
97
The Dawning of the Age of Psychotherapy
119
Part
II
Traditions, Traditions, Traditions
147
Chapter 6
Chapter 7

Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter
10
The
Individual
Differences Tradition
The Developmental Tradition
The Humanistic Tradition
The Behavioral Tradition
149
177
207
233
Part
III
From Here
to
Uncertainty
261
From Theoretical Divisiveness to
Eclectic-Integrative Therapies
vii
263
viii
Contents
Chapter 11
Epilogue
Appendix A
Appendix B

Name Index
Subject Index
Coming of Age As a Profession
The Expansion of Counseling
Psychology
Markers and Milestones
in
the Evolution
of Counseling
Psychology
291
313
317
319
323
333
List
of
Figures
1.1
John
Dewey
21
2.1
James
McKeen Cattell
41
2.2
Alfred Binet
44

2.3
Donald
G.
Paterson
67
3.1
G.
Stanley Hall
78
4.1
E.
G. Williamson
98
4.2
John
Darley
100
4.3
C.
Gilbert Wrenn
104
4.4 Leona Tyler
107
5.1
Sigmund Freud
121
5.2
Carl Gustav
Jung
125

5.3
Alfred Adler
127
6.1
Lewis
M.
Terman
167
6.2
Donald Super
173
7.1
Jean
Piaget
180
7.2
Henry Borow
198
8.1
Carl Rogers
209
9.1
Ivan Petrovich Pavlov
235
9.2
B.
F. Skinner
249
ix
Fhispage intentionally left hlank

Preface
Some years ago
in
one
of those
all
too rare moments of reflection it
occurred
to
me that I was only three lifetimes away from the very
beginnings of modern psychology.
It
is
generally agreed, as we will
see, that what we
call
"scientific psychology" began with Wundt's
laboratory
at
Leipzig around 1879. Similarly, applied psychology is
seen
to
have begun with the work of Francis Galton in England at
about the same time.
A short time later James McKeen Cattell,
one
of Wundfs first
American students received his
Ph.D.
at

Leipzig and went on to work
briefly with Galton. Cattell coined the
term "mental tests" and
went
on
to a distinguished career
in
both academic and applied psychology.
In
1911,
E.
K. Strong completed
his
Ph.D. with Cattell at Columbia,
and in turn embarked
on
a distinguished career
at
Stanford.
One
of
his
students was C. Gilbert Wrenn, a pioneering leader of counseling
psychology and
my
mentor and later colleague
at
the University of
Minnesota. At this writing
Gil

Wrenn
is
alive
and
well
and living
in Arizona.
I have been moved since that realization to
try
to understand
and
make sense out
of
all
of the ideas, ideals and events in those three
generations
that
have produced what we presently call counseling
psychology.
A dear friend and colleague who encouraged and stimulated
me
in
the early phases of this project was the late Henry Borow.
Unfortu-
nately, his failing health and eventual death prevented our collabora-
tion from really taking shape. This book
is
dedicated to him.
xi
Donald

H.
Blocher
Min
neapolis,
MN
Fhispage intentionally left hlank
Introduction
The history of counseling psychology
is
part of
the
history of the
twentieth century.
It was born out of the compassion, idealism
and
social concern
that
ushered in a century that seemed
full
of
hope
and
promise for a better world and a richer and more
fulfilling
life for
all.
It
has
sutVived
two world wars, the Great Depression,

and
the
past
40
years of turbulence and
turmoU.
The long trek from social reform to professional psychology is
the
story of many dedicated
men
and women whose ideas and ideals have
paved
the
path
to
our present. There have been relatively few attempts
to chronicle
the
Jives
and accomplishments of these pioneers. Much
of our history seems to be buried
in
the musty pages of committee
reports
or
proceedings of conferences and conventions.
What has seemed to be missing from this rather sketchy
and
scat-
tered body of literature

is
some feeling for
the
people, the flesh-and-
blood men and women, who in three brief generations have articulated
the ideas, advocated for the ideals, and engaged
in
the conflicts,
competition,
and
cooperation out of which has come what
we
pres-
ently call counseling psychology.
Noticeably absent also from most of our chronicles of events
has
been any real appreciation
or
understanding of the monumental social,
economic and political forces that have shaped our
lives
and our
century. The role of social reform, the contributions
of
applied psychol-
ogy to two great wars, the boom and bust of
applied psychology
during
the
Roaring Twenties and the counseling of the despairing

jobless in the Great Depression are
all
integra] aspects of
our
history.
The return of
the
veterans after World War
II,
our nation's descent
into the Cold War, and the race for space have
all
molded
our
profes :·
sion.
The
struggle for human rights, the Women's Movement,
etl:mic
diversity, and multiculturalism are
all
vital parts of our past as well as
our present.
This book
is
an
effort to create a set of fresh perspectives within
which we can better understand ourselves, our profession,
and
our

century.
xiii
Fhispage intentionally left hlank
In
the
Beginning
Fhispage intentionally left hlank
1L
Guidance: A Product
of
the
American
Conscience
Sometimes people
call
me an idealist.
Well,
that
is
the
way
I know I
am an American. .

America
is
the
only
idealistic
nation

in
the
world.
-Woodrow
Wilson
Speech
at
Pueblo, CO
November 8,
1919
H
istory, like time itself, has no logical beginning and
no
discern-
ible end. Every event,
no
matter how cataclysmic, is always
preceded
by
others that have helped
to
shape and cement
it
into the endless mosaic that
is
human history.
It
is
historians, themselves, who choose the departure points and
climactic events

that
best provide coherence and continuity to their
own visions of a distant reality. The history of counseling psychology
is
no
exception in this regard. It
is
possible
to
detect
the
roots of
counseling in the education of squires
in
the Court of Charlemagne
(Miller,
1961), or even to trace the origins of its literature to the
earliest outputs of the Gutenberg
Press
(Zytowski,
1972). It is equally
possible to choose the date of publication of a pioneering book, or
the convening of a national conference (Aubrey, 1977) as points of
departure from whence to unfold
the
story of counseling psychology's
emergence
as
a profession. Such milestones may be important, but
in themselves they seldom shed much light on the

zeitgeist
out of
which a new profession actually came into being.
The history of counseling psychology is, after
all,
much
more
than
a mere chronology of meetings and publications, organizations and
3
4
In
the
Beginning
committee reports. It
is
rather a history of ideas, and the story of the
men and women who generated, articulated, .and applied those ideas
on
behalf of the values, causes, and ideals to which they were person-
ally
committed.
New ideas and new ideals are generally born out of active engage-
ments with
the
overriding issues, problems, and conflicts that charac-
terize the lives and times of
the
individuals who expound and advocate
them. So it was with those whose pioneering vision and achievements

helped to launch the counseling profession. Rather than
to
begin their
story at any single, arbitrary point in time,
it
seems more reasonable
to commence with a brief account of
the
events that were shaping
the nature of American society around the beginning of the
20th
century. These were the forces and events that energized the "spirit
of the times" from whence came the ideas and ideals of the pioneers
of what eventually
became counseling psychology.
The years around
1900
in
the
United States were, to borrow Dick-
ens' classic phrase,
"the best of times and the worst of times."
The
years following the end of the American
Civil
War were witness to a
veritable economic and social explosion. The
full
impact of the Indus-
trial Revolution, combined with Westward expansion and a flood of

immigration, created a
new
and vastly different America than that
which had existed on the continent only a few years earlier.
Mark Twain called the period following the
Civil
War the "Gilded
Age."
It
was a time of the amassing of great fortunes, of breathtaking
technological advances,
and
of dramatic conquests and ruthless exploi-
tation of natural and human resources.
Historian Sidney Lens (1969) described
the
transformation in
this
way:
Statistics of growth were breathtaking. Population tripled from
23
million in
1850
to
76
million at the
tum
of the century. From
1859
to

1919
the value of manufactured goods increased by thirty-three
times. Giant corporations and trusts dotted the country. Heavy industry,
such as steel, replaced in importance light industry such as shoes, cotton
goods, flour. The industrial revolution was
finally
in
full
swing, remaking
the country in its own image.
(p.
127)
The transformation of
the
country was geographical
and
psycholog-
ical as
well
as economic. In the years following the
Civil
War, a parade
Guidance:
A
Product
of
the
American
Conscience
5

of new states joined
the
Union. Most of these were carved out of the
great heartland of
the
continent that only
20
years before mapmakers
had
labeled the "Great American Desert."
The
new states
and
the
old were bound together in a frenzy of railroad-building.
By
1890,
the
United States had
more
than
160,000
miles of railroads,
or
about
one
third of the world's total (Garraty, 1968).
The
bonds that bound the American nation and people together
were stronger than rails, however.

As
one
social historian
put
it:
So
great numbers of Americans came to
be1ieve
that
a new United
States,
stretched from ocean
to
ocean, has miraculously appeared

publicists were savoring
the
word "nation" in this sense of a continent
conquered and tamed.
It
was a term that most of all connoted growth
and development and enterprise

An age never lent itself more
readily
to
sweeping, uniform description: nationalization, industrializa-
tion, mechanization and urbanization. (Wiebe,
1967,
pp. 11-12)

One
of
the
many ways
in
which this dramatic transformation af-
fected
the
daily lives of ordinary people was
in
the
ways
in
which they
earned their
living.
The
American ideal of making a
Jiving
had, from
the
time of Thomas Jefferson,
been
that of
the
independent, self-
employed farmer, artisan,
or
storekeeper.
The

expansion
of
slavery
in
the
South had tarnished and threatened this ideal and
the
work
ethic
that
grew out of it. In a very real sense,
the
Civil
War
was
a
struggle between two
vastly
differing economic systems
and
the
consequences that flowed from each, as much as a conflict over
the
moral issue of slavery itself (Rodgers, 1978).
Abraham Lincoln, whose own career seemed
to
mirror
the
success
theme-log

cabin
to
White
House-had
constantly pointed
up
the
differences between a
"master-servant" economy
in
the
South
and
the
free labor economy of
the
North. In
the
late
1850s,
Lincoln
repeatedly told Northern audiences that
"There is no
permanent
class
of hired laborers among
us" (Rodgers, 1978).
Even as
the
Civil

War began,
that
claim was in
the
process of
becoming
an
illusion. By
1870,
a scant 5 years after
the
end
of the
war, when
the
first complete occupational census was taken, between
60
and
70%
of
the Northern labor force worked for wages. In the
most highly industrialized states such as Massachusetts, the proportion
was between
75
and 85%.
6
In
the
Beginning
The changes in the nature of work in the newly industrialized society

triggered new concepts of
the
work ethic and particularly vastly
dif-
fering notions about the just rewards of labor. These ideas
and
the
interplay of moral, intellectual, and economic issues that they triggered
occupied
the
thinking of labor leaders, industrialists, and philosophers
for the next half century.
It was the conflict between these sharply differing views of what
constituted a just and healthy society that set the stage for
the
social
reform efforts out of which the Guidance Movement,
the
forerunner
of today' s counseling psychology, first emerged.
The moral basis for widespread social reform movements quickly
became apparent as the processes of industrialization and urbanization
proceeded. Mark Twain's
"Gilded Age" had a gold facade
that
was
very thin indeed. The tremendous expansion of wealth, territory, and
population that characterized the
"Gilded Age" had not produced a
new utopia

on
the American continent. The rapid increase of industrial
production was accompanied by some improvements in material living
standards. Real wages,
that
is,
money wages equated for purchasing
power, rose sharply in
the
1870s
and
'80s
as technological advances
made labor more productive while the abundance of manufactured
goods brought down prices (Garraty, 1968).
By
far the most dramatic result of the new industrial era, however,
was the astounding concentration of wealth and consequent political
and economic power in
the
hands of giant corporations and the relative
handful of people who controlled them. The economic, political, and
social upheavals that were
set
in motion by this unprecedented concen-
tration of wealth and power made
the
years around
1900
a turbulent

and even violent period. A considerable portion of the burgeoning
population had failed
to
benefit noticeably from the vast increase in
total wealth. Even those who had profited temporarily often saw those
gains vanish
in
the throes of financial panics and depressions, and
the business failures and unemployment that inevitably followed.
Recent immigrants, Southern sharecroppers, prairie farmers, and
unskilled factory workers
all languished at the bottom of the newly
established social and industrial ladder. The great safety valve in Ameri-
can society, the frontier, with its seemingly endless supply of cheap
land and inexhaustible natural wealth, had disappeared. With it went
the lure of adventure and
the
promise of a fresh start.
By
1890,
the
West provided no escape from the harsh realities of urban slums and
rural poverty (Norton et
al., 1986).
Guidance: A
Product
of
the
American
Conscience

7
These realities were indeed harsh for countless nwnbers
of
people.
The economic and social conditions under which millions
of
people
lived
were almost incomprehensible to most Americans today.
The average annual earnings of American workers were between
$400 and $500
per
year. A standard wage for an unskilled laborer
was a dollar and a half a
day-when
he
could get work. According
to the census
of
1900, nearly 6
1/2
million workers were unemployed
for some time during the year. Nearly
2 million were idle for 4 to 6
months of the year. The average working day was 10 hours, 6 days
per week. Many workers had far longer hours. For example,
in
1900,
the hours in the New York garment industry were 70 hours
per

week
{Allen,
1952).
Child labor was an accepted part of
the
economic scene. Some
26%
of boys
betl veen
the ages of 10 and
15
were considered "gainfully
employed."
More than a quarter of a million of such children worked
in
mills
and factories.
Virtually
no safety standards existed to protect workers, including
children.
In
1904, a careful assessment of poverty in
the
United
States indicated that more
than
10 million peop]e were "underfed,
underclothed and
underhoused"
(Allen,

1952, p.
56).
This
out
of a
total population of
76 million.
The results of these conditions were often social
turmoil, bloody
strikes, riots, increased crime, and political corruption.
The
journalists
who kept
these
unsavory conditions before
the
American public were
christened
"muckrakers"
by
Theodore Roosevelt when their revela-
tions hit too close to home.
THE
AWAKENING
OF
SOCIAL
CONSCIENCE
The reaction
of
a great number of Americans from

a11
walks of
life
to this widespread poverty, corruption, and abuse of power was a
concerted demand for reform. This demand
has
been called "the
awakening of
the
American conscience."
It
was within this awakening
that the ideas and ideals that energized the Guidance Movement took
root.
The
demand for reform had begun
to
gain momentum
in
the
1880s.
As
one
historian put
it:
Dozens of groups and
individuals
carne
forward
to

demand
civil
service
reform, the
eight
hour
day,
scientific
agriculture, women suffrage, en-
8
In
the
Beginning
forcement
of
vice
laws,
factory inspection, non-partisan
local
elections,
trust-busting,
wildlife
conservation, tax reform,
abolition
of
child
labor,
businesslike
local
government, regulation

of
railroad
rates,
less
patroniz-
ing
local
charity,
and
hundreds
of
other
causes

(Thelen,
1973,
p.
200)
The onset of a devastating economic depression in 1893, together
with the growing frustrations of reformers, led these disparate move-
ments to coalesce into what became known as the Progressive Move-
ment. This rising tide of reform and demand for greater social,
economic, and political democracy was so powerful and pervasive
that the period from
1900
to
1920 has been called "The Progressive
Era" (Smith, 1985). The Progressive Era reshaped American Society
into what we recognize today and brought with it the antecedents of
the counseling profession.

The particular focus for reform that helped to energize the Guidance
Movement concerned the nature of work in the new industrial world
and the kind of preparation that was required for young people,
if
they were
to
be more
than
victims caught up in a system which they
were unable
to
understand, and with which they were helpless to cope.
The arenas within which
the
Guidance Movement began were
twofold. Reform of the educational system was a paramount objective,
but the newly developed profession of social work was often
more
relevant for immediate action, simply because so few young people
were actually in school, even
at
the
tender age
at
which they were
forced to begin employment.
In
1900 the average number of years of formal education was a
little less than 7 years in
the

North and about 3 years in the South.
In the South, the average public expenditure for education was
$9.72
per pupil
per
year
(Link
& Catton, 1967).
Between 1900 and 1915, about 14.5 million new immigrants
arrived in the
United States. In
the
peak year of 1907 alone,
more
than
1.25 million new arrivals passed through
open
portals into
the
land of hope and opportunity.
The vast majority of these new Americans faced
the
challenge of
learning a new language, adapting to a new culture, and
at
the
same
time earning a
living
for themselves and their children (Daniels, 1990).

Not surprisingly, the whole Progressive Movement focused
upon
the needs of youth. Historian Robert Wiebe (196
7)
put it this way:
Guidance: A
Product
of
the
American
Conscience
9
If humanitarian progressivism had a central theme
it
was the
child

The child was
the
carrier
of
tomorrow's hope whose inno-
cence and freedom made him singularly receptive
to
education
in
ratio-
nal, humane behavior.
(p.
169)

The reformers' central focus
on
children and youth was seen in
their efforts to ban child labor, enforce compulsory education laws,
improve urban environments with playgrounds and parks, and most
of
all,
create schools attuned to the needs of
all
of
the
children of
all
the people.
The problems of preparing young people for stable and rewarding
work
in
the industrial world was a
key
concern. In
1887
Edward
Bellamy's utopian novel,
Looking Backward, had described his vision
of the society of the future. Bellamy, whose novel sold a million copies,
had described the workings of
an
educational system that provided
what would later be called vocational guidance.
The

vocational education movement was the first effort to provide
systematic preparation for entry into work. Most secondary schools
of
the
time were essentially academies that were designed to prepare
intellectua1ly talented students for entry into colleges and universities.
VOCATIONAL
EDUCATION:
PARENT
TO
VOCATIONAL
GUIDANCE
The
vocational education movement advocated radical changes in
curriculum
to
include courses relevant
to
entry directly into the indus-
trial world. A number of vocational high schools were opened. Ac-
cording to
John
Brewer (1942), the actual practice of vocational
guidance probably began with a teacher named George Arthur Merrill,
who began to include exploratory work experiences as
part
of
the
curriculum in a "manual training high school" in San Francisco
around

1888.
In
1894
Merrill organized a new school,
The
California School of
Mechanic Arts, that devoted its
final
2 years to specialized preparation
in a trade. This curriculum required that students choose a trade,
which in turn required some assistance
in the decision-making process.
There was apparently no designated counselor,
but
the .faculty and
administrators furnished systematic assistance in the choice process.
10
In
the
Beginning
The vocational education movement gained momentum rapidly
during the
1890s
and into
the
new century. Not
all
of its adherents
were social reformers. Quite apart from the Progressive Movement,
a rising chorus of criticism was directed toward public education.

The gigantic industrial system required skilled workers
at
an
ever-
increasing pace. The generally low level of educational attainment of
workers entering the labor market was as much a source of concern
to
the "Captains of Industry" as it was to the social reformers.
Studies of school-leaving and educational achievement, such as
"efficiency expert" Leonard Ayers' Laggards in Our Schools, pub-
lished in
1909,
spurred
the
demand for real changes in the public
schools. The slogan for this demand was
"social efficiency."
The vocational education movement was divided over the question
of whether special vocational high schools should be created
to
train
students,
or
whether
the
existing school curriculum should be broad-
ened to meet the needs of non-college bound students. Germany, the
great industrial
rival
of

the
United States at the turn of the century,
had developed
an
elaborate system of special industrial schools
to
supply skilled workers
to
its industries.
In
1906,
the National Society for the Promotion of Industrial Educa-
tion
(NSPIE)
was formed.
The
NSPIE brought together a diverse and
often conflicting set of interests and ideologies.
It
included bankers,
industrialists, labor leaders, and philanthropists, as
well
as reformers
and educators. From
the
first,
the
NSPIE was
tom
with dissension.

Fortunately, the need for some kind of system of vocational guidance
was generally recognized and accepted
by
all.
The foremost issue
that
provoked disagreement arose over the
question of curricular reform of
the
existing public school, versus the
desirability of creating a new system of industrial
or
vocational school
education that was separate
from and independent of the public
school. Interestingly,
the
debate focused primarily around changes in
what we would now call the junior high school years, because few
people really believed that
12
years of schooling of any sort was a
realistic option for the average student!
This issue served to crystallize the ideological differences within the
vocational education movement. At the first national conference of
the NSPIE, held
in
Chicago in
1908,
the issue was hotly debated by

two of the most charismatic and influential personalities
of
the time.
The opening address of
the
Conference was delivered by Charles
Eliot, the President of Harvard University. Eliot had written for some